Cartograms offer an interesting way of displaying data. In a since the map adopts a customized projection based on the values of the data being represented. The following link below provides instructions and a script to get you started. http://blogs.esri.com/esri/gisedcom/2009/10/16/exploring-data-using-cartograms-within-arcgis-desktop/ If your looking for ideas, check out this 1960 map on freight...

Obesity and diabetes have become an epidemic problem in US and its almost certain that someone you know is/has been effected by these two issues. This ESRI Storytelling with Maps blog is hosting a map that shows the correlation between the two using a swipe tool. View the live map...

Last week in an initiative to be more transparent with spending the Obama administration released a new website, performance.gov. The website is filled with maps, tables, graphs and data available to the to public for free. There are also links to other initiatives to help the public understand where our...

This video shows you how to set up differential thrust / steering on the FrSky Taranis. This radio makes it very easy to set up custom mixes. Differential thrust / steering allows you to use the rudder input to influence the amount of throttles given to a vehicle with two motors. The most common uses...

On Sunday morning, February 15, 2015, the FAA released a proposed set of rules for small unmanned vehicles (UAV). The original documents can be found here: FAA sUAS Proposed Part 107 The two big ones: You will not need a private pilot license. Must maintain line of sight (LOS) – Sorry Amazon, no deliveries via...

In the near future I’m going to start publishing my aerial imagery. The Goal is to use all open source applications and have several options for download. The following applications were used for the map below: VisualSFM, PMVS, CMPMVS: Used to create the point cloud, mesh and stitched photo QGIS: Used to georeference the imagery....

After the 2010 BP Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico, Gliders were used to skim the water and detect oil, but at the time aerial drones were just beginning to take off in the hobby world. Fast forward 5 years and anyone can buy a “drone” for under $1,000.00. Now researchers are using off...

Over the last year PyScripter has become my primary Python Integrated Development Environment (IDE). Its a great application and If you want a free and open-source IDE or if you work for a organization that likes to take all your computer rights away (no installs)…PyScripter is for you. Its very light on resources and supports IntelliSense or code auto-fill. PyScripter supports color...

This was a test using a small unmanned aerial system sUAS to create a 3d image. Im using an APM 2.6 mounted on a Y6 Hexacopter. The images were captured with a GoPro3 with a 2 axis gimbal. The camera was set to take a picture every 2 seconds and I used 20 images from...

One of my favorite web magazines posted a list of “must reads” for mapping (and non-mapping) people. “How to Lie With Maps”, “From Here to There”, “Maphead” and “On the Map“, by Simon Garfeild (not mentioned in the article) are at the top of my list. http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/08/map-book-list/ “How...

Both flavors of ArcGIS, ArcInfo and ArcEditor both come with the COGO extension. This makes drawing with Coordinate Geometry (COGO) a snap. If you have Arcview and no other third party extensions you might be missing out…or maybe not. With a couple of changes to the editor options, you can draw using COGO and using...

If you work in ArcGIS like me, you know it lacks in the cartographic style department. The ESRI Mapping Center has put together a collection of maps and tutorials on how to spruce up your maps and get away from the boring, out-of-the-box styles. Click on the map you like and get short tutorials on...

XML has become very popular in giving users the ability to parse large amounts of data between programs and databases. Many have adopted XML schema and developed variations of the it. HTML, KML and the popular GPX schema have a very similar look to XML. Using python and more specifically ArcPy, the ESRI blog user...